when john boehner started to answer the other day and he said well, our plan is to raise revenues on the rich, he was co opting barack obama's language and we read this week about the purging and the removal of conservatives and tea party members from their committee assignments because they didn't vote the way speaker boehner wants. that seems to me to be evidence that a surrender is coming. >> well, i'm not sure it's the appointments so much as the substance of the negotiations. i think, you know, once you cave on rates, you've given up -- the president says it's the principle for him that republicans have to cave on rates because he pretends that you can't raise the revenues you want, meaning the money you want for the treasury by doing it through deductions, eliminating deductions and loopholes which is what everybody agrees is the way to do it. that's what reagan did with tip o'neill in 1986. they eliminated deductions, credits, loopholes, etc., and they were able to lower rates, and that created a real economic engine. so you can raise this money by eliminating deductions. the